Lady Madeline's Folly Read online

  "Cousin Aldred, delighted to make you welcome," she said, offering her hand, like a gentleman. Aldred blinked in surprise, but stepped forward to grasp her fingers and give them a firm shake.

  "Lady Madeline, delighted," he replied, as his eyes made a quick trip from the top of her fashionably tousled dark curls to the tips of her equally fashionable feet, clad in patent slippers. Neither was the lively face omitted, nor the graceful figure.

  She took no objection to this scrutiny, occupied as she was in a similar examination of her caller. "I hope you left the family in Manchester well," she said politely, as though she were doing no more than making civil small talk. In fact, her every faculty was alert to judge his accent, his manner of expressing himself, his quickness. It was always amusing to annoy the ladies by appearing with a new escort.

  "Tolerably well, thank you, ma'am. Papa tells me Cousin Fordwich is fine, and I can see there is nothing amiss with your health." This speech held just the proper amount of flirtation and admiration for a new young acquaintance of the opposite sex.

  She smiled with satisfaction. "Do have a seat, Mr. Aldred, and let us become acquainted. Such a pity we cousins grow up with never a peek at each other. It is always interesting to meet grown cousins for the first time, isn't it?"

  "Not always so interesting as on this occasion," he replied with a gallant smile, as he accompanied her to the settee. He waited till she had arranged her skirts before joining her.

  "Would you care for some coffee?" she asked. "I can see by your cheeks, and hear from that howling wind, that it is deuced cold out."

  She judged correctly that the fleeting rise of his brow was caused by her using the word deuced. She enjoyed to shock provincial friends with her city expressions.

  "Thank you. That would be lovely. The fire looks tempting. Would you mind if I go to warm my hands?"

  "Not at all. We'll sit closer to it, shall we?" She purposely walked a pace behind him, to observe him from the back. The shoulders were a little too padded, the waist nipped in more tightly than was fashionable. The hair too was cut shorter than that being worn by the urban bucks.

  These details were not only acceptable but welcome. There was no point in having a protégé if she could not help him, point out the little improvements, add the refining touches. Al­ready it had darted into her mind that he would make an interesting protégé. The boots, she was happy to see, were unexceptionable. Much could be judged by a man's boots.

  "Papa tells me you are putting up with a friend," she went on, in a spirit of conversational small talk that hid her rampant interest in him. "Would I be likely to know him?" She sat on one fireside chair, Henry on the other facing it.

  "So he tells me," Aldred replied. "Taffy Barker, a friend from my university days. He says all of London knows Lady Madeline, and admires her." There was a glint of a smile in his eyes, a hint of admiration. He looked around the room as he finished his speech. The room too pleased him. It matched the woman—elegant, rich, good taste. He had learned that the correct method of proceeding was not to mention these things, however. To draw attention to them would imply a lack of familiarity. "How cozy this is," he said when he had finished his examination of the spacious chamber.

  "Yes, we hardly use the larger rooms once the cold weather hits us. Taffy Barker, you say." Unexceptionable! To hear too that her cousin had been to university was encouraging. "That would be Oxford then, if I am not mistaken?"

  "Yes, we were at Christ Church together a few years ago, and have kept up the acquaintance since, mostly through correspondence, but Taffy has also been to my home to visit me. It was his idea that I come to London."

  "Is it to be more than a visit?" she queried, already knowing it was so.

  "Yes, I am looking for a position. I am only a younger son, you must know, but I did not come here asking for help. I came to pay my family's respects to you and your father. Lord Fordwich is out, I take it?"

  "Papa will not likely be home at all today. The prince regent has come back to town, you see."

  "Oh," he answered blankly. "Your father is a good friend of the prince, is he?"

  "Good God, no! Especially not at this time!"

  "What is special about this time?" he asked.

  Before long, Mr. Aldred was hearing about the likelihood of the prince unseating the Tory party, and putting a Whig government in to rule instead.

  "You seem very much interested in politics," he men­tioned after a little talk.

  "We live, eat, breathe, and sleep politics in this house, Cousin," she admitted readily. "But enough talk of me. What sort of work will you be looking for?"

  "It is embarrassing to admit that after my years of uni­versity, I have not the least notion," he confessed. "I would have been wiser perhaps to have taken Holy Orders, or studied for some profession—the law or medicine." He sat thinking a moment. When he spoke, he said, "I wonder if there won't be plenty of opportunities for positions with the new government when it takes over. It stands to reason a new broom will sweep out a goodly number of the old boys."

  Such an expression of interest in working for the op­position would have sent Lord Fordwich flying into the boughs. Lady Madeline was not the least distressed. It showed her he was wide awake, alive to an opportunity when he saw one. She would soon head him in the proper direction.

  Before lunch was on the table, she had already begun dropping hints of so interesting a nature that Mr. Aldred had become half a Tory. Other comments revealed that so far as political principles went, he was not very well versed in partisan politics at all.

  "Yes, no doubt there are opportunities on either side," he agreed over a raised pigeon pie, "but there is no advantage to aligning oneself with a party on its way out the door, if you see my meaning."

  "There is many a slip twixt the cup and the lip, Mr. Aldred. The regent's main friend on that side of the house was Charles Fox. Now that he is dead, the inclination to change the government will not be so strong. Of course some of Prinney's best friends are Whigs—Lord Moira, Sheridan, Lord Hutchinson and others. It is not certain he will depose Perceval, though he does hate him for his support of Princess Caroline."

  "The regent's wife, you mean?"

  "Yes, he took her side some years ago when the trouble developed between them. It has been a dreadfully unhappy marriage from the outset."

  "The princess is extremely popular in the countryside," he told her.

  "Well, she is not terribly popular here," she said stiffly. "Only the Whigs support her. We have more allies on our side. Lady Hertford, a great friend of the prince, and even the prince's own brother Cumberland, are by no means Whiggish. Never speak the words Catholic Emancipation before either of them. Then too, some of the Whigs wish to call off the Peninsular War, and I cannot think Prinney would like that."

  "I personally believe Catholic Emancipation is long over­due, but as to the war, surely no man who calls himself an Englishman would speak of stopping now, when it seems Boney is pulling many of his troops out of the Peninsula. I hear rumors he is mounting a campaign in Russia."

  She nodded in satisfaction to hear he was well aware of what passed around him, even if he had no particular interest in the government. Approving of Catholic Emancipation was tolerable—many of her father's crones did likewise. After lunch they returned to the grate in the Gold Saloon.

  "You lead a very interesting life," Henry said, as she offhandedly mentioned various doings with the nation's most elite personages.

  She smiled softly and began to reel him in. "Did it never occur to you to involve yourself in Tory politics, Mr. Aldred?"

  "I am as ignorant as Paddie's pig in such matters," he confessed bluntly. "I haven't the connections for it, nor the financial backing either."

  "I will undertake to arrange the connections. We are cousins, after all. I would be happy to do it, but the ignorance you must correct yourself."

  "I am a fast enough learner. You are very kind, ma'am. I am convinced it would be
a great bore for you, to have an unlicked cub like myself on your hands. Then too, there is the matter of money."

  "I expect your credit is good. You cannot have done anything to destroy it. You've only arrived in town."

  "I would not like to run into debt!" he said, aghast.

  "It won't cost as much as you might think. We will find something that will keep you afloat for the nonce. Papa knows the ins and outs of the Civil List. You have some money, I expect?" she asked quite frankly.

  "I am not completely destitute," he answered, showing a little pink around the collar at the open discussion of what was generally considered a private matter.

  "Good. Use it wisely. Set yourself up in an elegant little apartment."

  His eyes made a slow tour of the room he sat in. The ceilings, twelve or fifteen feet high, embossed with ornamental plaster medallions, the beautiful brocade draperies, the handsome and obviously expensive furnishings—all were encompassed in his look. "I could not afford much elegance," he decided wistfully.

  "You won't need much, Cousin. A bachelor does not have to entertain at home. One decent room to greet your friends and associates is enough. Of course you'll need a bedroom and kitchen and so on, but they can be as spartan as you like. I'll help you find something. Your friend Taffy may have an idea what places are to let. We shall work something out. Come back to me tomorrow morning. Let me have a day to look into possibilities."

  "You are very kind," he said. "Why should you go to so much trouble for me?"

  "Why, we are cousins. What is family for, if not to take an interest in its members?" Her interest in this particular member was so high she wished to take him in hand at once, to begin that very evening taking him into society. But on this momentous night she must be at Almack's, where he could not enter in provincial tailoring, even if she could arrange a voucher on such short notice.

  "I hardly know what to say. I did not come here to beg. I hope that is not your understanding."

  "Rubbish! We are cousins, and will soon be fast friends. I look forward to seeing you tomorrow morning. I shall leave it free for you. Bring Taffy along, if you wish. Now I must be very rude and push you out the door. I am promised to a tea party this afternoon."

  This was not quite true, but she knew she might receive callers and did not wish to introduce her cousin to them yet, not till she had him brushed and polished and somewhat versed in the theories he would henceforth hold regarding the proper running of the country.

  She smiled happily as the front door closed behind him. How exciting it was after all, having a new boy to spon­sor. Such a charming, handsome young one, too! He put her other protégés in the shade. She must beware, or she would be setting up a flirtation with him.

  This was nonsense, of course. She always set up a flirtation with her boys, when they were single, as they usually were. It was quite a matter of course that they would fall head over heels in love with her, what was new in the situation was that the passion might, for once, be reciprocated. How high could Mr. Aldred not fly, with her considerable fortune and influence at his back?

  The oddest thing about it all was that Cousin Aldred had not leapt at her offer to help. She sensed some little reluc­tance in him that intrigued her. He was a proud man, she thought, and liked him better for it.

  "Lord Eskott, ma'am," the butler announced, disturbing her thoughts.

  Her smile faded, to be replaced not with a frown but with a very calculating expression. It was not often a Whig passed through the portals of the Second Court of St. James. She must quiz him to see if he knew anything about Prinney's plans.

  * * *

  Chapter 3

  “Show him in, Evans."

  "Not necessary, Evans," Eskott said over the butler's shoulder as he lounged into the Gold Saloon, disregarding all the laws of polite behavior. Evans cocked his head aside and shook it, disclaiming any responsibility for this ill-behaved caller.

  The hostess took no offense; neither did she pay any particular heed to her guest's appearance. She was accustomed to his tall, rangy form, his severely elegant tailoring, his dark hair and eyes. She had not observed either when his summer complexion faded to winter's more sub­dued tone. She was only likely to comment on his appear­ance if he showed up without a fresh toilette, as he occasionally did after a hard day at the House. Today his appearance was unexceptionable, so she said nothing.

  "Hallo, Maddie. Got yourself a new boy?" Eskott asked, pacing forward to sit beside her on the striped satin sofa, throwing one leg over the other. "I met a bright-eyed and bushy-tailed young provincial coming out as I entered. He called me sir, the whelp."

  "Did you expect him to call you madame?"

  "No, 1 didn't expect him to call me anything. We had not been introduced."

  "How encroaching of him, to utter a civil good day to a stranger met on his cousin's doorstep!"

  "Cousin, is he? I took him for your new boy." There was a mocking, jeering expression on the caller's face at this sally.

  "Never mind that. You are no more interested in him than in the social gossip. What do you hear at Westminster?"

  "That the old boys are to lose their posts. A black day for you, milady," he said with relish.

  "Has he asked for resignations then?" she demanded in­stantly.

  "Nope. He's called Grey and Grenville to meet with him. It looks as though Perceval is to be kicked out. That will give a good deal of satisfaction to Prinney, to repay him at last for supporting Princess Caroline."

  "Who do you think will be offered the prime minister's post?" she asked, eyes sparkling. Eskott observed her, smil­ing.

  "Prinney would like Moira, but there is no hope of it. Grey and Grenville would not sit still for it. Brougham, I suppose."

  "What seat do you fancy for yourself, Eskott? The wool­sack? You would like to be lord chancellor, I expect."

  "I shouldn't mind being keeper of the national purse, but as the position includes as well keeper of the conscience, I may settle for a seat on the Treasury instead. I would not want such a heavy embargo on my soul as the conscience of the nation."

  "I see you have been reviewing the duties of the chan­cellor all the same," she pointed out with a knowing smile.

  "Gave myself away, did I?"

  "Just so."

  "I must set a seal on my tongue. You are too good a spy. Let us speak of less dangerous matters. Who is this cousin I met on the doorstep?"

  She outlined Aldred's background, while Eskott listened closely. "I see it is your intention to take the lad in hand, but you must realize any friend of Taffy Barker is not likely to do you credit in any capacity but that of court clown."

  "He is not at all like Taffy. He is intelligent—sharp."

  "Also tall, handsome, and a bachelor. Don't omit the more stringent of your requirements in your boys."

  She lifted her chin and tossed her head. "This has nothing to do with romance. It is business."

  "I never met a lady under eighty who did not prefer conducting her business with a handsome gentleman. Young Aldred is tolerably pleasing in appearance," he added with lukewarm enthusiasm, regarding her all the while from the corner of his eye.

  "He is very handsome!" she countered swiftly.

  A conning smile peeped out on Eskott's dour face. "Not that you care, of course," he pointed out.

  "You are perfectly horrid," she accused. "I don't know why I put up with you."

  "Of course you do. You like to weasel Whiggish secrets out of me. No other member of my party is cork-brained enough to let you make a cake of him."

  "True, and it serves you right, since you only come here to try to discover of me what Papa and the ministers are up to."

  "That is not my primary reason for coming," he disagreed mildly. "We boast only one conversable lady in our ranks, and Lady Holland is half an outcast due to her divorce. It is my misfortune that the other two in the city are of the wrong political persuasion, but I visit both Melbourne House and the Second Cour
t of St. James, despite that sad detail. I come for some lively female conversation, a glass of Fordwich's excellent sherry, and of course to admire your beautiful green eyes."

  "When you begin on the beautiful green eyes, I know it is time to beware."

  He shrugged. "Any chance of sampling the sherry?"

  "I'll call Evans... and let him watch you pour yourself a glass," she finished, as he went to the wine table.

  "We'll see if wine softens your hard heart, as flattery don't do it," he said, handing her a glass.

  "You waste your time, Eskott. Papa is in conclave with the cabinet. I haven't the least notion yet what is going on. I have asked him to let me know as soon as anything hap­pens."

  "What is happening at the moment is that Prinney is with the Old Lady of Manchester Square, reading the Bible."

  "What—with Lady Hertford at such a time?" she asked, frowning.

  "It gives you a notion of how seriously he takes the situation, does it not?"

  "At least he's not with Sheridan or Lady Holland, to have his reason perverted with your wrong-headed think­ing."

  "His new lady doesn't let him visit with Lady Holland, and would put Sherry on the interdict list too, if she dared. As to my perverted views, the reforms, electoral and oth­erwise, are not the perversion but the cure. There is too wide a discrepancy between the wealthy and the lower classes. We only want to share a little. The alternative, if you have read your French history, is revolution. You can't expect to keep ninety percent of the population in rags, without even a voice in Parliament, and not have them rise up in arms. How you can call us perverted astonishes me, Maddie. But you are too much your father's daughter to listen to reason, so I shan't preach."

  "That's what our minister usually says after a long and tedious sermon—that he shan't preach."

  "Which minister is that?"